Scottish Text Society publications > Third series > Ratis raving and other early Scots poems on morals

XU
INTRODUCTION.
As a guess, one may suggest the second last decade of the
century, 1480-90. There are marginal notes and correc¬
tions in a contemporary hand, possibly that of the original
scribe, and there are numerous corrections and deletions
in the text made by him at the time of writing. A later
and rougher hand has added some notes on ff. 9, 24,
and 29.
That the MS. is a copy, at least in part, appears from the
fairly frequent errors, from omissions (including one
line left blank on f. 25 (see p. 29), presumably because
not decipherable), from the scribe’s misplacement of and
doubt as to the reading in Ratis Raving, 1. 1306, f. 29
(see p. 37), and from the difficulty and unintelligibility of
certain parts of the text. The catchwords ending at
f. 46, the blank pages at the end, and the coarse leonine
verse added below the last line of text on f. 54 indicate
plainly enough that the MS. is complete and independent
and the scribe’s task completed. From the condition
of the first and last folios, which are considerably more
soiled than the rest, it may be inferred that it was a
separate MS. for a time. The Lancelot which follows
as No. 7 in the composite MS., though apparently in the
same hand and with the same size of page, must have
been conjoined with the preceding part at a later period,
no doubt at the time when all the Scottish pieces were
gathered together into one volume.
At the end of Dicta Salomonis (Appendix 6) appear
on f. I2a the words Expliciunt dicta Salomonis | per
manum V de F, &c. This is evidently the scribe, but
he has not been identified. The late Dr J. T. T. Brown
in accordance with a theory of authorship which he held,
suggested—but perhaps not quite seriously—that the
“ initials be read as William de Foulis, the name of the
scribe of King James the First.” 1 If he meant the well-
1 Op. cit., p. 159.